Who Knew?

​Welcome to our "Who Knew?!" TechKey Blog! Our goal is to post a little something every week that might be useful to... someone... while providing a medium for us to keep in touch with our current and future clients. It's a work in progress but we hope you enjoy.

Who Knew? #40 (6-14-22)

Yes, it's that time again… for this weeks Who Knew?. This weeks Who Knew? was inspired by a cute little feature which came out in one of the recent Windows updates. But who needs cute… right?
Feature updates for Windows are not entirely necessary in order to keep Windows running well and secure. In fact, sometimes they can be more of a nuisance. We often avoid them for as long as we can because they will often change things better left alone. If it ain't broke, why fix it… especially in a productive office environment.

In this case, After a recent feature update we noticed these "cute" little icons had suddenly appeared to the right ON the search bar. In todays case, it is a graphic of a horizon and a large full moon. The graphic alone is not too much of a big deal but if we hover our mouse over it, a search window opens automatically letting us know that we are experiencing a "Super Moon" at the moment.

Now, to some, this might have been pretty interesting information and good to know. But if you are just trying to get work done and windows are popping up automatically etc. etc., just because your mouse inadvertently hovered over an icon, well this can be somewhat annoying and distracting.

Why does Microsoft feel it necessary to turn this feature on automatically? Fortunately, it is quite easy to get rid of this "cute" little feature. If you'll recall from a previous Who Knew? segments, we talked about the power of the "Right Click". Simply "Right Click" on the task bar and hover your mouse over "Search" and select "Show Search Highlights" to turn this feature off. Simple right!?

While you are there, you may want to explore some of the other features you can turn off or on within the Taskbar. We like to keep ours reasonably clean so we've turned off "News and Interests" and turned on the "Search Box" because we love the search bar - We its power in a previous Who Knew?. (you could just have the Search Icon there if you like) There are lots of settings there to play with, some of which you might like to activate so don't be afraid to have a look.

You have much of this same control in Windows 11 as well. In Windows 11 Microsoft has grouped things within a settings window which will pop up after you select "Taskbar Settings" once the task bar is "Right Clicked".

Speaking of Microsoft changing things on you when these feature updates are applied… we have had customers experience their default web browser changing back to Microsoft Edge and even how their system handles PDF files (all of a sudden opening in a browser - surprise, Microsoft Edge - instead of Adobe Reader). Annoying.

As always, if you need help with some of these features please do not hesitate to give us a call. It's what we do!

That's all for this weeks Who Knew? We sure hope you enjoyed! As always, if you found it useful or beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like. As always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries. See you next week for Who Knew? #41.

Who Knew? #39 (5-26-22)

And we're back for another segment of Who Knew?!
This weeks segment touches on some more, rarely known but super handy, shortcuts. These shortcuts are specifically used when typing documents… Enjoy!

• To move your cursor quickly to the previous word, type CTRL-Left Arrow
• And of course you can move word by word to the right by typing CTRL-Right Arrow
• To recover something you just deleted… press ALT-Backspace to bring it back
• To delete the entire word to the left of the cursor, press CTRL-Backspace
And how about a few handy mouse tricks you can use when typing a document:
• To highlight a single word for editing, double click on it
• To highlight a complete sentence for editing, triple click one of the words within it
• And yes… click four times within a paragraph to highlight the entire paragraph

Some of these shortcuts take a bit to get used to but if you spend a little bit of time with them, they will become second nature and real handy.

That's all for this weeks Who Knew? We sure hope you enjoyed! As always, if you found it useful or beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like. As always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries. See you next week for Who Knew? #40. And of course if you need TechKey Support for your Business or Home, send us a PM or visit our website.​

Who Knew? #38 (5-3-22)

And we are back to bring you another addition of "Who Knew?". For this week we'll talk about how you might be able to give new life to that old PC or MAC collecting dust in your closet.

Do you have an old system that couldn't keep pace with the ever changing software environment forcing you to replace it even though, in every other way it seemed to work fine? Maybe an old laptop that just seemed to be sluggish and won't run the latest Windows operating system (OS). Well, Google and their Chrome OS may be able to come to the rescue with Chrome OS Flex.

What is Chrome OS. It is a lightweight operating system that powers Chromebook systems which are typically laptops or tablets. These tend to be more budget minded systems that rely on the "cloud" and rely mostly on cloud based applications such as Google Sheets, Google Docs and Microsoft OneDrive Office apps with scaled down versions of Word, Excel etc.. We often recommend these types of systems for consumers who primarily work within their browser (Google Chrome, FireFox etc.) to access their web mail (Rogers Yahoo, Gmail, Outlook etc.) and even Online Banking and Accounting. These systems usually don't have large amounts of storage for files on the system although you can choose a configuration with considerable storage if you wish. Instead, they rely on the user to have their own cloud storage account (Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive etc.)

Chrome OS is a lightweight operating system which does not require the system horsepower that systems need to run Windows OS or Mac OS. Which is why an older PC or Mac should be able to handle it quite well.
So now that you know what the Chrome OS is all about, Google has been working on their Chrome OS Flex and has recently released the development version for install. This OS promises to bring the Chrome experience to that old, compatible PC or Mac essentially turning it into a Chromebook.

You can find a full list of compatible systems they have tested so far here: https://support.google.com/chromeosflex/answer/11513094...

So if you are interested in giving it a try, have a look to see if your old system has made the grade. On that page there is a link with detailed instructions on how to proceed.

Or why not hire TechKey to do it for you? Give us a call or text to discuss 905-869-0232 or send us an email to info@techkey.ca.

Some Cautions:
1. Even though your system is said to be "Verified to work", expect some glitches while this is still in development stages.
2. If your system is a laptop: plug it back in and see if the battery will still hold a charge. If it doesn't, It is possible to get a replacement battery for most systems. On Amazon for usually about $60.
3. All of your files on this old system will be wiped clean by this process
So, maybe consider putting that old PC or Mac to good use. As a browsing workstation in the kitchen to check emails, recipes etc. Maybe even a media server? Many Ontario students use ChromeBooks for school so your kids might make use of it. Your old system need not be a laptop, compatible desktop systems can be turned into Chromebooks as well.

That's all for this weeks Who Knew? We sure hope you enjoyed! As always, if you found it useful or beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like. As always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries. See you next week for Who Knew? #39. And of course if you need TechKey Support for your Business or Home, send us a PM or visit our website.

Who Knew? #37 (3-2-22)

And yet again, it is time for another segment of Who Knew?. For this week - To Power Off or Not To Power Off?, that is the question…

The answer is not exactly straightforward. Studies show that a majority of users power off their systems at the end of the day or after they are finished with them. Is that bad? Not really, but there are advantages and disadvantages and it depends on many things.

Each time your system powers off and then powers back on, that process shoots electricity through all the circuits and takes parts such as fans and hard drives, which have moving components (SSD drives exempted), from a stand still to full operation in milliseconds. So that is a hit to the system… it's hard on the system.

With new systems some experts say to power down at the end of each day and put your system through that stress for the first year only, while it is still under warranty. The general rule of thumb in the IT world, although obviously not perfect, is: if it's going to fail, it'll be in that first year. So, power off at the end of the day for that first year and then, as the system gets older and especially after the warranty is up, you may want to just keep it running so that the, now older system, isn't subjected to that power surge on a regular basis.

But wait, what about all those updates etc., that Windows constantly wants to download and apply? If your system is off, that can't happen. And Windows, by default, is set to only apply updates "after hours" so that you don't get bogged down with an update during the day when you need to get some work done. Of course, these settings can be changed to suit your needs. The answer is: it will then be up to the user to set aside time to search for updates and apply them as needed. We prefer you hire a company like TechKey.ca to give your system the overhaul it needs from time to time

Ok, so… what if we just set the system to go to sleep when we are not using it for a bit (you can control that setting after all). Having your system go to sleep is considered a better option for some because when you "wake it up", yes power gets restored to some items within but most of the items were just kind of listening and waiting for you to return and get back to business. Unfortunately though, when your system is asleep, it will not get the earlier mentioned security updates. Ironically, given the security updates that Microsoft continually releases, this is the default setting for Windows systems.

This brings us to our recommendation which is: Leaving your system on and setting it up so that it does not go to sleep and just the monitor turns off when you walk away. It draws negligible power and is therefore only a very minor burden on your electricity bill. Yes, there is a case for the "under warranty" scenario mentioned earlier as well. From a security standpoint, you can set your system to go back to the login screen.

At the end of the day, it is important to make sure your system is getting the updates it needs, especially the security updates, when they become available. In doing so, don't forget to give it a fresh re-boot from time to time - Windows in particular loves a good re-boot!

(If your system is a laptop, different rules apply… it is recommended you put your laptop to sleep, power off, or put the system into its hibernation state prior to moving it)

Did we answer the question?

That's all for this weeks Who Knew? We sure hope you enjoyed! As always, if you found it useful or beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like. As always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries. See you next week for Who Knew? #37.

Who Knew? #36 (2-8-22)

It's time for another segment of Who Knew?. This week we are going to talk a little about browsing, privacy and specifically, Ads. There different options available that many are not aware of that can help if privacy is a concern.

The internet is part of our everyday life in ways that, 20 years ago we would never have dreamed of. Over that time though, it has also become a huge marketing juggernaut.

It is no coincidence that, after you searched and even purchased something on Amazon (for example), that the web pages you then go to afterward with your Browser is now showing you ads about that item you searched for. So annoying especially if you've already purchased the item. This is just a simple example of how our actions on the internet are being captured, tracked and used in an attempt to market products to you. As annoying as it can be, it's a great tool for businesses to market their wears. We all want the internet to remain "free" and advertising helps to make this happen. They are able to streamline and target their messages based on your building demographic profile as well as your internet usage.

There are ways to limit the ads you are being exposed to and limit the amount of information you are sharing without your knowledge. One of the popular ways is to "Add On" an ad blocker to your browser. These "Add Ons" or "Browser Extensions" are pieces of code designed specifically to watch your internet traffic and intercept what the software believes to be an Ad.

These ad blockers seem to work well but in our opinion, it is still unsettling that "something" is monitoring and tracking our usage. How do we know if these applications are not themselves farming out our internet usage for their own gain? The short answer is, we don't.

One of the easiest way to secure your privacy while on the internet is to change your Browser. All of the main browsers monitor our usage for this and other purposes. We won't get into who the worst offenders are. One browser we have been using with enormous success which does not allow ads and does not track your usage, is called Brave. The Brave movement was founded by the creators of FireFox, a Browser that used to be viewed as less invasive but has fallen victim to the juggernaut. We invite you to use your favorite search engine and check out Brave and it's history for yourself. If you do decide take it for a test drive and download it, be sure to go to the appropriate site - their site is brave.com. As we have discussed in previous Who Knew? Blogs, there are many spoofed web sites for almost everything you are looking for out there, sites that are trying to trick users into downloading or accepting something and in doing so, exposing you the user to some level of vulnerability so please, click carefully.

This topic of privacy is so vast. We really have just scraped the surface. We have talked in the past about how you must never let your guard down while browsing the internet and if privacy is a concern of yours, hopefully this blog gave you some insight. Next week we will continue on the privacy vein and talk briefly about search engines but until then, and as always, if you found it interesting or beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like . As always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries. See you next week for Who Knew? #37.

Who Knew? #35 (1-20-22)

So, hopefully you have had a chance to check out our previous Who Knew? segments. If not, head on over to TechKey.ca or our Facebook page and check them out. For this week, we are going to talk about Window organization within Windows 10 and show you how you can work more efficiently with two or more windows (documents, spreadsheets etc.) at the same time.

Let's say you are working on a document and you need to refer to another document in a different (or the same) application maybe for figures within a spreadsheet or information found on a web page. You could "Alt-Tab" back and forth which is quick but tiresome if you are constantly needing to go back and forth... or, you can use this little trick to quickly organize your windows applications . It's really easy and handy.
Making sure both documents you need to work within are open in their own window, using your mouse, click and hold the top colour bar of one of your windows and drag it to the right (or left)... keep dragging as though you wanted to drag it off your screen until a transparent window frame appears and takes up half of your screen - that's telling you where your window will fall when you let go. Now, let go of the mouse button and that window you were dragging will automatically drop into that transparent frame, positioning itself on half of your screen with the other half revealing your other windows that are available for selecting. When you click one of them it will take up position on the other half of your screen. Now you have the two windows you would like to work with, side by side allowing you to easily work back and forth.
What's cool about this feature is, not only is it real easy to do but you can resize their relationship with each other by making one window bigger while the other gets smaller... you can do this by dragging (click, hold and move) the divider bar to the left or right. Both windows will adjust their size together. Another thing you will notice is, between these two windows, if you simply bring your mouse overtop of one you can automatically scroll within that window with your mouse wheel without the need to click on it. Move the mouse to the other window and it will then become active for scrolling.

Go ahead and give it a try. You won't break anything and once you get the hang of it, you'll see how handy it can be.

That's all for this weeks Who Knew? As always, if you found it useful or beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like. As always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries. See you next week for Who Knew? #36.

Who Knew? #34 (1-13-22)

And it's that time… "Who Knew" #34. Our last Windows 11 installment was just before the holidays but in subsequent weeks we focused on some important security concerns plaguing cyber land . This week we wrap up and summarize our Windows 11 experience to-date.

So, it's been a few months now working in the world of Windows 11 and since its release, we have done more than a dozen updates from Windows 10 to 11 for our clients. Of course, this is on systems that "qualify" for the upgrade based on Microsoft system requirements. (see Who Knew #28)
Of those systems upgraded, only one system gave us some issues. Using Windows "Check for updates" showed this particular system (only a few months old) as qualifying, but the update continued to fail. We had to create a Windows 11 media stick (USB) to boot from but once we did that, the install went quite smoothly.

So, not bad right?

Our overall opinion of Windows 11… if it ain't broke, don't fix it… just yet. If your Windows 10 build is working fine for you, then our recommendation is to continue on. However, if you are one that likes new things and likes change, our experience with the update process has been quite good. Do your backups and create a restore point before you begin.

Of course, TechKey.ca would be happy to handle this upgrade for you… give us a call and we'll perform the update as well as some initial configuration for you and in most cases, have your system ready for the next business day.

Windows 11 - Pro's (in no particular order)
- The new look and feel is quite refreshing
- The menu system seems to flow a lot better from the Windows Icon (Start) and onward
- The everyday icons have gotten a nice facelift
- The taskbar now defaults to group your icons in the centre… but is that a Pro?
- We found our "performance" machine and most other systems we upgraded, to be a little snappier with everyday tasks - opening and closing windows apps, folders etc.
- All of our installed apps, some a little older, seemed to accept the operating system change without complaint
- The ability to multitask has become a lot easier and is a strong feature
- Tighter security from the ground up

Windows 11- Con's (again, no particular order)
- The new look and feel… we put this in the Con area as well because, when you are used to something being in a certain place or behaving in a certain way, so many changes can be frustrating for some
- PopUp menus when right clicking desktop items is a little glitchy. Windows has removed many familiar items and provided us with icons instead and grouped the others into "Show more options". Not a deal breaker but if you are doing a lot of file manipulation and house cleaning, it can be frustrating. The popular icons will be across the top… or will they? It depends on where the item you clicked on is located on the desktop
- If you use "SlideShow" as your desktop theme, you may notice a glitch if you are working in an app and can see a portion of your desktop as well. The desktop may flicker from time to time when the "Slideshow" is changing the image… the solution, change your them or maximize your window
- Windows Explorer itself, the heart of Windows file management, has freezed up on occasion for us. Never requiring a reboot but just short delays. It is hard to say if it's the application working with Windows Explorer (in our case - Photo editing) or Windows explorer itself. We just know that this behaviour was not happening pre-Windows 11.
- Adjusting default apps is now a little trickier. You'll have to do a few more steps to change your default browser for instance. Upgrading from Windows 10 to 11 will hold your existing settings though and apparently future Windows 11 updates may change this behaviour.

In summary… Make no mistake, this is a major overhaul of Windows. Maybe it should have been called Windows 2022? If you are one that likes change it is a refreshing overhaul and has gone quite well for us and our customers that have decided to make the switch.

If you like Windows 10 and you are quite happy with how it is working for you, then we recommend to hold off for now. Likewise, If you are a business or person that does not have a compelling reason to upgrade, we recommend continuing with Windows 10, especially if your everyday workflow involves many third party apps working together.

Hopefully this Windows 11 summary has been helpful and informative. Please take a moment to "Share" and/or "like" so that others may follow and as always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries.

Who Knew? #33 (1-4-22)

For this weeks "Who Knew" just a friendly Happy New Years greeting! Clearly recent news in Ontario is not how we wanted to start this new year. If you find yourself needing TechKey Support while you are working from home or for any online schooling needs, give us a call. If it's TechKey, well… it's what we do. We offer curb-side system servicing and even remote support options. Visit any of these pages for more information: Our Web Site www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport looking forward to hearing from you soon! Happy New Year to all! Please, stay safe and healthy!

Who Knew? #32 (12-7-21)

Welcome back for another segment of "Who Knew". Last week for "Who Knew" we broke away from our Windows 11 discussion to revisit the important topic of technology scams which are running rampant. I say technology and not just online because these scams come in all forms including email and phone calls. What was missed last week was another way these criminals are attempting to trick us which is through Spam texts to our cell phones. You may receive a text saying "you have been selected" or "your package has been delayed" etc. Please be cautious before interacting with these attempts to steal your hard earned money.

There is good news on the Spam phone call front which was announced last week. The CRTC has mandated that Telco's (Bell, Rogers etc.) must implement new technology that blocks spammers from disguising who might be calling you, otherwise known as Caller ID Spoofing.

Currently these spam calls seemingly come from a local number (area code for instance) which leads the receiver to believe that perhaps it is a legitimate call. So this is good news but it sounds like just the ability to disguise these calls will be stopped with this technology and it will only be effective against VoIP calls (digital technology using the internet to make the calls) which means we will still receive these annoying calls from these criminals but hopefully not as many. So, we must continue to look and question before we answer and don't give out personal information unless you are certain with whom you are communicating with.

That's all we have for this weeks "Who Knew"… we promise to return with more Windows 11 insight next week. In the meantime, stay well and safe out there. Please take a moment to "like" and/or "Share" so that others may follow and as always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries as well as how TechKey Computer Support Services can help you or your organization with its IT needs.

Who Knew? #31 (11-25-21)

And we are back again for another weeks issue of Who Knew! For the past few weeks we have been delving into the world of Windows 11. For this week, I feel compelled again to talk about two different types of scams running rampant. Mainly cyber online/email scams and phone scams.

Tis the season I guess. Sad but true that at this time of year it seems that online and phone scams increase in frequency trying to convince unsuspecting people to give up their hard earned money. Perhaps in posting the next few points as reminders I might help cause someone to pause and possibly prevent them from falling into one of these rather convincing traps:

1. Know that companies like Rogers, Bell, Yahoo etc. etc. etc. are NOT going to send you an email asking you to confirm your account and password by "clicking here". The latest one I received was from Netflix - "I had better act now because my account is about to be suspended because my latest payment did not go through" - paraphrasing of course.

A client of mine received an email, seemingly from Rogers and it talked about Yahoo (Rogers uses Yahoo for email)… it had logos, etc. and looked very convincing. It said Yahoo was updating their client information blah blah blah. This client fell for it and next thing they know, they couldn't send/receive email, friends were emailed seemingly from him asking for money "to get his daughter home", he couldn't login to his email… I was able to work with Rogers and we had everything reset.

Another one… an email with a zip file attached, very brief… usually says something like "Your important information is attached and here is your password". The trick to this email is it is seemingly coming from someone you know and trust. Don't do it!!

Let's not forget the one about the package that went to the wrong address. This one is particularly deceptive because, well, especially over the last 18 months, we are hitting record numbers in online shopping with deliveries arriving weekly if not daily. Many of these emails are seemingly from UPS etc. Just pause, slow down and question everything!

Bottom line, question ALL email you receive that asks you to "click here" or "open this file" or "confirm this" etc etc.
1. Phone fraud… this one kills me. NO the border services are NOT calling you to… whatever the reason is (I never get that far). I've been getting this one almost daily lately. OR… No the CRA is NOT calling you and the RCMP is not about to show up on your porch to arrest you… well, hopefully not.

These emails and calls work on percentages. They use "bots" (automated systems) and huge call centres to blast out these calls and emails because they know that many do owe money to the CRA… that many do travel and cross the border, many are expecting a package and that many do need their ducts cleaned (latest one I received… could barely hear the person the call centre was so busy). They are sending these out to millions of people (emails in particular) and if they just get 1% to fall for it, to give up hundreds of dollars, they make millions.

Hopefully this has helped as a reminder to slow down and question things before you click or answer that phone… etc. Next week we hope to be back with another Windows 11 segment. In the meantime, stay well and safe out there. Please take a moment to "like" and/or "Share" so that others may follow and as always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries as well as how TechKey Computer Support Services can help you or your organization with its IT needs.

Who Knew? #30 (11-18-21)

Welcome back for this week of Who Knew where I am going to continue my coverage of Windows 11. Over the past few weeks I talked about system requirements as well as some changes for this new build of Windows. This week and the weeks to come I am going to continue to uncover some noticeable changes and behaviour observations.

In the past I have talked a lot about the power of the "Right Click" within Windows. To recap, the "Right Click" is how the you can tell Windows to "Show me what I can do to this thing". One of the more common reasons that users tend to "Right Click" is when they want to do something to a particular file or folder located on the Desktop or within the File Explorer. When done, Windows used to present us with a familiar list of things we can do to the item. Within that list we often find things like "Copy", "Paste", "Delete", "Rename"… and more and where applicable. Well, Microsoft felt it was time to try and simplify this popup menu. Now when the user "Right Clicks" on a file (as an example) they are presented with a shorter list of items, each with their own icon and now shows some of the most used items represented as icons but grouped across the top (eg. Cut, copy, paste, delete).

But wait! Sometimes it is at the bottom of the menu!? What the… you see, it all depends on where your item is on the screen. If it is in the top half of your screen, the Right Click menu branches down and Windows puts the icons at the top. If the item is within the bottom half of the screen, the menu branches up with the icons at the bottom. I understand why they are doing this but I'm finding myself not being able to easily anticipate where the icon will be when I Right Click. Will the icon for delete be at the top or bottom of the menu?

And to make matters worse, if the associated item only has a small amount of options when you Right Click on it, the icons maybe at the top or at the bottom. Very confusing and somewhat annoying. This is especially true of items I Right Click on which are in the middle of the screen. When I Right Click on these items, Windows quickly puts the menu branching upward and then quickly changes its mind and branches the menu downward with the icons at the top. I'm going to call that a glitch and it's somewhat annoying and dizzy on the eyes.

Is this change a game changer? In and of itself, no. It looks great and what they have done makes sense. Perhaps it should have been done long ago. But for someone who has been using Windows for over 25 years, it's taking some effort to get used to. Up until now, when I Right Click to say, use the copy command, my eyes and hand pretty much knew where to anticipate moving the mouse pointer in order to select this command. Now I find myself looking around for it only to find its new icon waiting for me at the top of the menu.

And finally, when Right Click'ing, for most items within the shortened menu you do have the option of "Show More Options" and, when selected, it replaces the new menu with the old menu format. But in doing so, it gets rid of the graphic icons mentioned earlier… It's great that we get "More Options" when we want, but why didn't the existing menu just expand to reveal the other options. Instead the new menu quickly fades and the old menu replaces it.

Overall I am still liking Windows 11 but these little quirks are somewhat annoying. Hopefully they are easily addressed in subsequent releases.

Stay tuned for more Windows 11 discoveries which I will share with you in the weeks to come. Please take a moment to "like" and/or "Share" so that others may follow and as always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysuppor for previous Who Knew entries as well as how TechKey Computer Support Services can help you or your organization with its IT needs.

Who Knew? #29 (11-9-21)

And it's time for another entry of "Who Knew". Last week I talked about Windows 11 and how to check if your system is ready for this major Windows update… or… upgrade. I talked about my experience with the upgrade process.

I've now been using Windows 11 for a few weeks and it's been, for the most part, a good experience. However, if you are someone who doesn't take to change well, you might get a little frustrated with this upgrade. To hopefully help you decide if this upgrade is right for you, I'm going to spend the next few weeks of "Who Knew" sharing my experience with you so you can decide if you want to go ahead with the Windows 11 upgrade.

The very first thing I noticed after the upgrade was the font on the welcome/login screen - Segoe UI Variable - a refreshing clean look! And then… I logged in! My icons were where they should be so that is good, well… sort of… I looked down and the task bar was completely different. By default, Windows 11 groups and centres all your taskbar icons. It is now similar to Mac OS… well, more like Chrome OS. Hmmmmmm… and with previous versions of Windows, in the lower right of the taskbar you could individually and directly click the volume, or your network connection etc… now though, again much like Chrome OS, single clicking there brings up a group of those icons and more with convenient adjustments for each. For example, when this new group of controls are revealed you can adjust screen brightness, volume, activate airplane mode or turn bluetooth/wifi off individually… oh, you can even jump into system settings. Thankfully "if in doubt, right click" still works and you can jump into network, volume or battery settings by right clicking each of the individual icons from the task bar - it will bypass this the new control group popup.

I suspect many of these changes can be adjusted to make things feel more like previous windows versions. For instance, if you right click on the taskbar (if in doubt, right click), you can go into settings for the taskbar giving you a plethora of options one of which is to get those taskbar icons LEFT Justified - who ever heard of a Windows Start Icon NOT located at the bottom, far left!!?? Interestingly enough, I did not find a setting to "unlock" the taskbar. So if you are someone who has moved their taskbar to appear at the far right or left of your monitor… or even the top instead of the default bottom location, you maybe out of luck.
As I go down this journey of discovery I have to say, so far so good for Windows 11. On my power house PC (see last weeks "Who Knew" for specs) which I thought was very responsive before Windows 11, I find it even snappier. Is it faster, hard to say… it "feels" faster though. On my lesser bench PC, again it feels like there has been a performance boost. Without doing some bench comparisons with identical systems running both OS', it will be impossible to tell if this is actually the case. But again, it feels faster and snappy so I would say that's a good thing .

Stay tuned for more Windows 11 discoveries which I will share with you in upcoming Who Knew postings. Please take a moment to "Share" so that others may follow and as always, you can visit www.techkey.ca or our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Techkeysupport for previous Who Knew entries.

Who Knew? #28 (11-02-21)

Who Knew? #28
A few months ago "Who Knew" talked about the upcoming Windows 11 release… Well, It's heeeeaaaarr! So, I thought it fitting to spend the next few weeks sharing my experience with this reasonably major overhaul of Windows.

Windows 11 pretty much arrived right on time, Microsoft set the release date for October 2021. When I checked my system a few weeks ago through Windows Update (just do a search for Updates by clicking the magnifying glass, left side of your Task bar at the bottom of your screen, and typing in "Updates" and then clicking "Check for Updates"), I got a message saying "This PC will run Windows 11" with a big green check mark… all good right!? Below it though it said "Your PC does NOT currently meet the needed requirements.
You can continue to get Windows 10 updates…". My system in question - Intel Core i7-9750HF with 16 Gig Ram!! Reasonably new (little over a year), pretty fast system. A quick google search revealed that Microsoft was experiencing a bug with their compatibility checker. Yikes! Not a good start to say the least. With this knowledge I pressed on and manually downloaded the ISO file (making sure I was getting it from Microsoft and not some spoof site) - oh, an ISO file is basically the contents of a CD normally used to install programs, packaged up in one single "executable" file - and proceeded to install/update to Windows 11. ** I of course had backups of my important data and knew if things went wrong I had the means to re-install all of my main programs and data.

The installation went flawlessly! So well in fact that I proceeded to install on one of my lesser systems (my bench system) which also had the earlier mentioned compatibility glitch. This system is about 3 years old with an Intel i5-8400 CPU and 8 Gig of Ram (the minimum recommended for Windows 11 is 4 but… keeping it real, I recommend 8 as a minimum). Again, a flawless installation! So far so good right!

*** To see if your processor is on the "compatibility" list click on search within Windows and type in "System Information" and click it. From the resulting window, scroll down to processor. Take note and then goto this page from Microsoft: https://docs.microsoft.com/.../windows-processor... where you can scroll down to Windows 11 and select either AMD or Intel based on what you found within "System Information" (System Information will also tell you how much RAM or Physical Memory your system has). If your system does not meet these requirements don't fret because Microsoft has said they will continue support for Windows 10 through till Oct 2025.***

I've now been using Windows 11 for a couple of weeks and it's been, for the most part, a good experience. If you are someone who doesn't take change well, you might get a little frustrated with some of the changes. To hopefully help you out though I'm going to spend the next few weeks of "Who Knew" sharing my experience with you and you can decide if you want to go ahead with the upgrade… so stay tuned and we'll see you next week for Who Knew #29!

Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport.

Who Knew? #27 (10-26-21)

Who Knew? #27
Last weeks Who Knew introduced you to the many Windows Keyboard Shortcuts that are at your fingertips when using Windows 10. One of those short cuts was Windows Key + Tab. This combination reveals a feature that can be quite handy for those who strive to be as organized as possible. The Virtual Desktop.

Virtual desktops are kind of like having multiple monitors on your desk. Users who are so lucky will often group task minded icons in different areas of the two monitors. Virtual Desktops allow you to create multiple virtual desktops (virtual monitors if you will) which can be organized to keep you organized. For example, you could create a virtual desktop that only has icons for your most used spreadsheets, or maybe projects. You could open up all your accounting related apps under one desktop, then change pace for a bit and switch desktops to do some marketing projects. If you use your computer for personal and business use you could create a virtual desktop for each, easily switching back and forth.

To create a virtual desktop press Windows Key + Tab, this will reveal the Task View (another cool feature we can talk about another time). At the top left click the + New Desktop. And just like that, a new fresh desktop is created. When you click the new desktop, your main desktop will disappear. Don't panic! Simply press Windows Key + Tab again, and choose your main desktop. In fact, you can switch from desktop to desktop by pressing Windows Key + Tab, or Windows Key + Ctrl + (left arrow) or (right arrow). Pretty cool eh... now you have two (or 3 or 4...) monitors in one!

Well, that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #28!

Who Knew? #26 (9-16-21)

Who Knew? #26
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew? As we all know, Windows has evolved quite a bit over the years. Each and every iteration is an attempt by Microsoft to perfect the users experience and make the PC easier to use. Some would argue they have succeeded (now in Windows 10) and others say... "how do I do that now!?"

One little known tool that existed in previous versions of Windows is the "snipping tool". A really cool tool used for capturing things from your screen, mark them up as needed and save. With Windows 10, Microsoft is phasing this tool out in favour of "Snip and Sketch". You can still use both the old tool and the new for now, but the new "Snip and Sketch" is quite good!

Microsoft has made it easy to access Snip and Sketch by using the handy Windows Logo Key. Simply press the Windows Logo Key (that's the key to the left of the space bar that looks like a window) and while holding it, press "shift" and "s". When you do that, you are automatically put in "snip" mode and your cursor changes to a + . Now click and hold the cursor at the upper corner of what you want to capture and drag to the opposite corner and release the mouse button. Don't worry, you'll see the capture square get big as you drag, letting you know what will be captured when you release the mouse button. When you release the mouse button, a window will pop up. Go ahead and click the resulting window and you will have an opportunity to review and alter (that's the "Sketch" part) with mark ups etc. Then, save it for later or paste into whatever project you have been working on.

Besides the square for snipping, there are 3 other capture types - lasso capture, window capture and full screen capture. Go ahead and play with it... it works great and, you can't break anything. Have fun!

Well, that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #27!

Who Knew? #25 (6-28-21)

Who Knew? #25
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew? For this week, Who Knew that the Windows key (Windows logo key beside the space bar) could be so handy with some everyday tasks. In fact, there are tons of keyboard shortcuts that exist within Windows that are worth checking out...

Here are some of our Windows Logo Key + favourites:
Windows Key by itself: Pressing it just once of course opens your "Start" Menu

Windows Key + D: Show or hide the desktop - effectively minimizes all your open windows revealing the desktop... press it again and your windows open back up.

Windows Key + E: Opens your file explorer

Windows Key + L: Lock your computer - handy at lunch break

Windows Key + P: Opens up your monitor/presentation side bar... great for people with multiple monitors or hooking up for presentations.

Windows Key + (+) or (-): Zoom in and out with your display.
For even more Windows keyboard be sure to check out this article from cNet... (it is safe to click this link... we promise!)
https://www.cnet.com/.../all-the-windows-10-keyboard.../

Well, that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #26!

Who Knew? #24 (6-28-21)

Who Knew? #24
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew? For this week… “Who Knew” that the next version of Windows is just around the corner. Arriving possibly as early as October 2021 but expected closer to Christmas 2021. Read on for more information…
From a fresh new look to the ability to run Android apps, the new Windows 11 has some cool features that will help to make users more productive with the laptops, desktops and tablets. Here are just a handful of cool features:
• The ability to download and run Android apps. Yes that’s right. You’ll have access to over 500,000 Android apps including Disney Plus, Netflix, TikTok, Pinterest, Uber and more.
• Widgets – widgets are kind of a sneak peak at the particular app that is offering the widget. The weather forecast is the best example. The widget shows you a small pic of the current forecast – sun/cloud/rain and temp. Another widget might be a calendar widget showing you a quick snap of your appointments for today
• Microsoft Teams – while available now, in Windows 11 it will be built into the task bar readily accessible for use.
• Desktops – Windows 11 will allow you to create virtual Desktops. You’ll be able to create one for work, for personal use, etc. and you’ll be able to switch back and forth
• Layouts – Windows 11 will allow you to customize the layouts for all your open windows so that, if you often have a particular set of apps open, you can apply a layout to those apps
And now the big question. Will your current system be able to handle Windows 11. Unfortunately for many with systems over say… four years old, your system may not be compatible with Windows 11 but don’t worry, Windows 10 is promised to be supported with security updates etc., until at least 2025.
What are the system requirements for Windows 11? That’s a lengthy topic unfortunately as this version of Windows has some strict requirements in order for you to be able to successfully run it. Here is a great article from PC Magazine which is a pretty easy read and go through all the requirements quite well - https://www.pcmag.com/news/can-my-pc-run-windows-11 If that is too daunting for you don’t worry, give us a call and we can help you determine your systems compatibility.
What will be the Cost? Free! Wow, you can’t beat that right!? Basically, if you currently have a running copy of Windows 10, Windows 11 will be a free upgrade.
Well, that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #25!

Who Knew? #23 (6-21-21)

Who Knew? #23
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew? If you recall, last week we explored some of the power behind the Windows “Start” menu. For this week we will introduce some more light, fun and maybe even productive Windows tips.

Tip#1: This tip we’ve introduced before, but it bears repeating. There is a reason Windows based PC’s uses two button mice! Basically, If in doubt… “Right-Click”. Right-Click the desktop, the start menu, the printer icon… you name it. From within your browser, Right-Click on the page you are on or a graphic image. Let’s call all of these things… objects. When you Right-Click on an object, Windows presents you with a menu specific to that object as well as some common items such as “copy” or “paste” or “print”. A big one it usually reveals is “properties” allowing you to control the properties of that object. So YES… if in doubt, “Right-Click”.

Tip#2: Did you know that you can switch the orientation of your mouse? Basically, the default is set for right handed users with the index finger over the main, left mouse button. If you are left handed you can change this orientation so that the main mouse button becomes the right mouse button. This would of course change Tip#1 to “If in doubt… “Left-Click” . To change your mouse orientation simply type “Mouse” in the search bar located at the left side of your bottom task bar and select “Mouse Settings”. At the top of the resulting windows simply change the primary button from Left to Right. Easy right!

Tip#3: More Keyboard Shortcuts
Windows Logo Key + E: Opens Windows Explorer
Hold ALT key and press Tab key: shows you the windows you have open and you can repeat to jump from window to window and simply let go on the window you want to make it active
Windows + M: to minimize all of your windows (don’t worry, they are minimized to the task bar at the bottom of your screen)
Windows + (right arrow) or (left arrow): snaps the current window to the left, right or centre. When you do this, Windows will give you the opportunity to select an additional window for the other side. This tip is great for working back and forth between windows
Windows + (+) or (-): brings up the zoom command. Keep pressing and you can zoom in and out at will. Very handy for web pages and you want to look closer at an item or picture.

Tip#4: The F2 key: Just like in a spreadsheet, if you select a desktop item or a file on your hard drive… if you press F2 while that item is selected, Windows will allow you to change the name of that item.

Well, that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #24!

Who Knew? #22 (6-14-21)

Who Knew? #22
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew? So, last week we touched on some security topics again due to the influx of incidents happening over the internet. This week we are lightening it up a bit and are going to take a closer look at the Windows 10 Start Menu.

So, the Windows Start menu. That’s what we call the menu that pops up after we click the Windows logo at the bottom left of our Windows based systems or press the Windows Logo key on your keyboard. It has seen a lot of changes over the years. Windows version 8 gave the Start menu a new look with some pretty cool capabilities. When it pops up, it shows you an alphabetical list of all your programs but Windows Version 8 (and then 10) expanded on this by widening the menu allowing for an interactive area which can be customized in many ways. Here are some things that you can do with that “new” area of the Start menu:

1. First, Windows attempts to make life easy for its users by placing icons for applications it thinks the user might use the most. The first thing you might do with this “new” space is clean this up a bit by right clicking on any of the applications you don’t or won’t use on a regular basis and removing it from this expanded area of the start menu. Don’t worry, if you make a mistake or change your mind, you can still go to the alphabetical list of apps to the left, find the app you want to add, right click on it and select “pin to start”.

2. Now that you have gotten rid of and/or added your applications to this expanded area of the start menu, you may have noticed things are getting crowded. Like regular Windows and apps, you can adjust the size by doing a “left click and hold” on the right edge and moving the border to the right to make it bigger. So, that’s pretty cool!
And now that we know how to make it bigger… let’s organize
further.

3. Windows has put the default application icons into groups with group names. Moving your apps around from group to group or within a group takes a little to get used to but it’s easy to do. Simply single left click and hold and move to where you would like.

4. Now you might find that the group names are not as intuitive as you would like. Or you have moved an application icon out of a grouping thereby creating a new grouping without a name. You don’t have to use Windows group name suggestions. Simply single left click on one group name will allow you to rename it. If you want to add a grouping (you may already have by moving an icon around), you first need to add an additional icon app or move an existing icon out of a grouping and to a space on it’s own (left click, hold, drag and drop). This will create some space without a “group name” and you can left click on the space to add the group name (if desired). Whew – that was a mouth full!

Ok, so… now you can resize your start menu, add your favourite apps, remove some apps and create and change the groupings.

5. Lets go one more step further and adjust the size of your apps. In Windows, if in doubt… “right click”… right? Let’s do that to one of the apps on the expanded start menu. Some of the options revealed will allow you to:
a. Make the icon larger or smaller
b. Pin the icon to the taskbar (bar usually along the bottom of your screen)
c. Even Uninstall the application.

Go ahead and play with the size of the icon. You will notice that once icons are at their smallest, you can use that space to perhaps, put 4 small icons together. The size of the icon will determine how much of a sneak preview Windows can give you with that application with the larger icons showing you things like todays weather forecast for the weather app icon or even a glimpse at your mail for the mail app icon.
That’s probably enough about the Start Menu. Go ahead, play around with it and perhaps, get it working better for you. Once you have it the way you like you might find you are just a little bit more productive when using your computer.

Well, that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page TechKey Computer Support. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #23!

Who Knew? #21 (6-7-21)

Who Knew? #21
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew? So, unfortunately, due to recent events we have come across we are compelled to again, talk about internet/email scams that are out there circulating the internet. This week, EMAIL BOMBING… what is it, how to identify if you are a victim and how to protect yourself.

Email bombing is well, kind of just what it sounds like. It’s when your email inbox gets “bombed” or flooded with legitimate email usually in the form of “thanks for signing up to our newsletter”. A “bomb” is not just one or two emails but literally hundreds coming in over a short period of time. The goal of the bomb is to hide a legitimate purchase confirmation made in your name.

What the scammers do is, somehow, they get your username and password to a site where they can potentially purchase something significant and get it shipped to an address which they can monitor and pick it up when it arrives. In our real-life example, our customers Rogers username and password was used by the scammers to login to Rogers and go shopping. They made some seemingly legit changes to the account – internet package upgrade, things like that – then they went on over to the phone section and purchased two iPhone 12’s. Usually, the scammers will change the delivery address to one they know they can monitor and intercept the package when it arrives. In this case though, and this is kind of unnerving, they left the delivery address the same. You see, with Covid these days, packages are just being left on porches without the need for signatures even when requested. So, in this case, the scammers would have our customers home under surveillance. That is kind of scary right!

Anyway, prior to finalizing their purchase, the scammers send out what is known as a “Bot” program that uses the valid email of the victim and bogus names to sign the them up to gazillions of valid web sites all of whom send email confirmations of some sort to the address… the victim opens their inbox and gets bombed with emails. Having done that, the scammers finalize their purchase from Rogers for over $2,000 worth of phones. The confirmation and invoice from Rogers gets emailed but lost in the bombing run already in progress.

In our real life example, our client was lucky and noticed that one of the emails was from Rogers so they looked at it and sure enough, a purchase was made at Rogers for the phones. They called Rogers and confirmed that the scammers upgraded their internet and of course, purchased the phones. Rogers was able to cancel the purchase and return the account back to normal.

So, if your inbox gets bombed with email, don’t panic! Go through the email and determine if any are from organizations you work with or visit at least semi regularly. Review that email for a purchase confirmation and then contact them to straighten things out. Of course, now you will also have to change your passwords.

So, how to protect from this happening to you. One good way is to activate 2FA – Two Factor Authentication - wherever possible (also called MFA - Multi Factor Authentication, or 2SV – Two Step Verification). Especially at sites where you can make a purchase or access funds. With 2FA turned on at sites like, your bank, eBay, Amazon, Rogers, Bell, BestBuy… when you login, those organization will send a text (sms) message with a code to your phone. Yes, it’s a bit of a pain at first – one extra step when you often want to get in and get out really quick, but it’s an excellent form of protection – but the code usually arrives quite quickly. This is just one type of 2FA (using a text with a code along with your password) and like everything, each type has advantages and disadvantages. This site provides some excellent reading. It’s easy reading but covers the topic well so it’s long. www.twofactorauth.org

Cyber Space is an incredible place and without it, where would we be? (some might say… better off – LOL) but protect yourself out there! Just like taking a trip to a big city, take the steps necessary to keep yourself safe! Of course, if you suspect your computer has been compromised, give us a call!! If you need assistance to make sure you have the right safeguards in place, give us a call!! We are here to help!

Well, that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page TechKey Computer Support. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #22!

Who Knew? #20 (5-13-21)

Who Knew? #20

Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew?  Last week we got into some boring but important material about phishing and keeping yourselves safe in cyber world.  For this week, we are back to lighter topics with a couple of cool Windows 10 features that you can choose to implement… or not 🙂

The first is something Microsoft calls “Nearby Sharing”.  For those iPhone users you are likely familiar with airdrop – being able to quickly send files to people in your circle of friends who are close by.  Well, you can do that in Windows 10 as well. 

The second is Windows 10 Dark Mode.  Yup, it’s available in Windows 10 now.  We’ll show you how to activate it and decide for yourself if you like it or not.  Many reportedly find it easier on the eyes.

So, Nearby Sharing.  If there are more than one Windows 10 PC’s in your home or office, it maybe rather convenient if you could quickly send a file (picture, document… anything basically) over to another person if they too have Windows 10, are near by and are properly configured.  Yes, that last part is important.  Both or all the Windows systems taking part in the sharing need to be setup.  It’s pretty easy though.  In your search bar at the bottom left (you may have to click the magnifying glass) type in “Nearby Sharing” and hit “enter”.  You’ll see the section for “Nearby Sharing” in the resulting window.  Simply slide the switch to turn it on.  You’re all set.  You can choose to change the location where items will be saved to when sharing.  It currently defaults to your download folder.  Now remember, you have to do this for all the systems nearby which you want to be able to share files with.  Once everyone has this feature turned on, locate the file you want to share and “right click” on it and select “Share”.  If all goes well, the PC’s in proximity will be listed by name and you can simply click the one you want and off goes the file! 

The second feature is the Windows 10 “Dark Mode” feature which is all the rage across multiple platforms and devices (Android, iOS).  Microsoft finally got with the program (so to speak) and added it to Windows 10 so, assuming your system is up to date with all the feature releases from over the past 6 months or so, this feature should be available for you to check out and is easy to invoke.  In the search bar (bottom left – magnifying glass) Type “Colors” (US spelling 🙂) and hit “Enter”.  From the Colours panel under “Choose your color” simply change it to dark.  This will change most of the default menus, menu bars, task bars to a dark theme which most find to be easier on the eyes.  Turn it on, take a look around.  If you don’t like it, change it back… it is very popular

Bonus: there is even a “Dark Mode” for your facebook page – top right corner of facebook… click the down arrow and choose “Display and Accessiblity” 

That is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any past segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well!  We will see you next week for Who Knew? #21!


Who Knew? #19 (5-6-21)

Who Knew? #19

Who Knew? #19
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew?  Last week it was all about PDF’s which we hope you enjoyed.  In the last few weeks though, we have had several clients fall victim to very convincing phishing schemes so this week we felt it important to touch briefly on this security topic again (Who Knew #9). 

What is phishing.  Phishing (pronounced “fishing”) is a cybercrime where a target is contacted by email, phone or even text message by someone posing as a legitimate organization to trick you into providing sensitive information which they can then exploit.  As an example: It being tax time, some of these criminals might be posing as the CRA when they call or email you.

Recently, one client received an email seemingly from Rogers.  Rogers uses Yahoo - if you want to access your mail through your browser, you have to login through Yahoo using your Rogers account (unless you know how to setup Gmail to do that – but that’s another topic).  Knowing this, the cybercriminals sent out an email to our client (they do this using very sophisticated email harvesting schemes and phishing).  The email “from Rogers” looked very legit claiming that the Yahoo account needed to be updated or the victim would not be able to send or receive emails.  Simply “click here” to update.  In this case the client clicked and entered their Rogers information on what looked like a Rogers login screen.  The damage was done.  The cybercriminals then used that information to change their password and essentially remove access to their email.  They were able to harvest all the valid emails as well as sensitive information from their inbox and contacts.  So, if you receive an email like this treat it as suspicious. Often the clues are in the language and grammar used but if in doubt, call and confirm.

Another client was having Microsoft Office challenges, so they went online to see how best to contact Microsoft support.  They landed on a page they thought was Microsoft and were presented with splashes on the screen warning them that their system was compromised and that they had to call “this number” immediately.  In a panic, they proceeded to call and the criminals at the other end were very convincing and professional sounding.  After a few easy steps and a quick download the criminals had access to their system.  They showed them a few errors in the Windows logs (normal errors) and then gave them a verbal quote to fix things up.  Suspicious, our client refused and ended the call and contacted us.  Fortunately, the cybercriminals did not drop any malicious software and the cleanup was reasonably straightforward.

Another tricky one with all the online shopping going on.  An email seemingly from a legitimate courier (UPS etc) regarding the package you are expecting.  “Follow this tracking link to get an update on your package...”  Because you could very well be expecting a package, you might be tempted to just click and check it out.  Take a moment to verify the information before clicking and remember, hover the mouse over the link and look at the address it is sending you too carefully.  www.microsoft.support.com is NOT Microsoft.  It’s a place called “support.com”.

So, beware.  Beware of emails, telephone calls and even texts that ask you to take action or give out information.  It being Tax time, a common phishing scheme is to contact you posing as CRA or the RCMP.  Aside from just hanging up, if you are unsure maybe respond with “I’m sorry, you’ve caught me at a bad time.  Could I get your name and number and I’ll call you back?”  If it is a phishing call they will simply hang up.

Beware if:
It sounds too good to be true – someone wants to gift you $1,000.00 out of the blue… wouldn’t that be nice!

Sense of Urgency: you are being investigated, act now or the RCMP will show up at your doorstep email seemingly from a legit email address asking for your help… insert scenario here – usually financial – delete!! as in the Rogers/Yahoo example of above “follow this link and update your information or your email will be cut off”

Hyperlinks – are they going to send you where you think they are when you click them?  Check this one out – www.bankofarnerica.com – did you read “America”… look closer, the “r” and “n” together make the link look like a “m” – crafty!

Attachments – are you expecting an attachment?  Beware, stay away, don’t open!  Send a quick message to the sender to verify that they meant to send it to you.

Unusual Sender – as mentioned in item 2b, emails from someone you know but somehow the message seems “strange” or not quite right.  “Thought you might be interested” with a link to follow or an attachment.  Beware!! Our apologies for such a dry topic this week.  With the increased incidences we have heard about lately we thought it necessary to review this topic again. 

For more information on Phishing take a moment and visit https://www.phishing.org/what-is-phishing – Yes, that’s a safe link but good for you for being suspicious 😉!

That is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you found it informative and useful! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! HAPPY MOTHERS DAY WEEKEND to all those wonderful mothers out there.  We will see you next week for Who Knew? #20!
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Who Knew? #18

Who Knew? #18
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew?  Last week we shared with you a quick and handy way to navigate through all your apps listed in the Windows start menu.  For this week… Who Knew that you could create your own PDF file straight from the latest version of Windows 10?  (Most of this is relevant to the Mac and Chromebook users out there as well)

First off, what is a PDF?  Well, it stands for Portable Document Format.  Ok… so what is that and what are they good for?  From Merrium-Webster: a PDF is a computer file format for the transmission of a multimedia document that is not intended to be edited further and appears unaltered in most computer environments.  Did that help?  In layman terms then: A PDF is an electronic snapshot in the form of a file (PDF) of something you created or have on a computer and might normally want to print on paper.  Eg. A report or bill.  Was that better?

Ok, enough of that.  So, why might we want to create a PDF?  If you have a document or something, anything, created on a computer that you want to share with others in a reasonably secure way, PDF’s can be the answer.  The reason it is somewhat secure, PDF files are not easily manipulated, and they look just like the intended paper version when viewed on the screen or printed.  To change a PDF file, you typically need to purchase 3rd party software. 

Given it is currently tax time, our real life example might be: You have just put together your financial information on a spreadsheet on your computer and you need to get it to your accountant but you don’t want the accountant to be able to manipulate your figures and you don’t want to put the printed version in the mail. Instead of printing the spreadsheet and handing paper to your accountant, instead you can create a PDF (or print to PDF) and email the information with your PDF attached.

Ok, so hopefully now we “get” how cool PDF’s are and how they can be used.  But how do you create one.  Back in the day we needed to install a small little application that created a virtual printer… a PDF printer (or writer) … to your list of installed printers.  Now with Windows 10 we already have a printer called “Microsoft Print to PDF” available to use.  So, from our financial spreadsheet example, when you are ready to send the spreadsheet off to your accountant you still print it but instead of printing to paper you instead change your printer to the “Print to PDF” printer.  Once selected and you proceed with your normal printing procedure your system will bring up a window and ask you to name the resulting PDF file and where you would like to save it.  Typically, you would save it to a location within “Documents”.

Now you can draft an email to your accountant and attach that PDF file that you created.  Your accountant will receive the attachment at which point he/she can simply view it (the financial information) from their screen or print a paper copy to work with.

Another quick example might be: your landscaper has just drawn up some designs using their computer and they would like to send them to you for your approval.  Instead of printing to their large format paper and couriering the drawings to you, they can simply print to a PDF file and email the designs to you.

Whew, that was a little longer than we intended.  But that is all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you found it informative and useful! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #19!

Who Knew? #17

Who Knew? #17
Welcome to this week’s segment of Who Knew?  Well, we missed everyone last week.  Sometimes time just flies by too fast… For this week’s Who Knew?, it’s just a quick but really useful little tip that we have for you.

We have talked in previous issues about searching for apps or “things” on your computer using the search bar at the bottom left.  It is so handy, so check our previous issues and learn more about that.  This week is along the same vein.  Let’s say you have a particular application that you installed on your computer and you want to use it.  Most if not all apps when they are installed get listed in the Windows Start Menu for quick access.  From there, you can pin them to your task bar or to your expanded start menu.  But if you are like me, and just like to keep most in the general Start Menu list, there is a really handy way to find them.

To start, press the Windows Key at the lower left.  This will bring up the start menu with your list of programs.  Each program is grouped alphabetically.  If the program you want is “Word”, normally you would have to scroll down and find it.  Which, in and of itself, is not such a big deal… but try this.  Simply click the Alphabet group heading… “A”, “B” etc., and when you do so, the entire alphabet will appear giving you the option to jump to “W” where you will find your “Word” app. 

How cool is that right?  Yes, a simple little Who Knew but handy I think.

And that's all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you found it helpful! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment or any segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #18!

Who Knew? #16

Who Knew? #16
Welcome to this weeks segment of Who Knew?  So last week we had a little fun with our "Who Knew?" segment. Who knew that about the platypus and the wombat?  But now, back to our regular programming. This week, let's talk about AntiVirus programs. Not an exciting subject but an important one.

Is everyone familiar with what an AntiVirus program does?  Simply put, an AntiVirus (AV) program, or solution, is software that typically starts automatically when a given system starts up and it loads itself into memory (that RAM memory that your system uses to run programs). The AR sits there and monitors all the activity on the system, looking for something suspicious based on virus signatures that it has been taught to look for. To properly look for suspicious behaviour, AV programs are crunching their own processes, creating temporary files to be used for scanning and a whole slew of other tasks needed to do their job.  

Yes, there is a lot more to it than that but with that little bit of information we can begin to see why it is important to be properly setup with the appropriate AV software. When selecting an AV solution, consider what you might need coverage for.  For example, if you have children using your system, you might consider one of the AV suites (AV solutions that have multiple components and areas of protection) that basically try and protect your system from every threat known to man that might infect your system. The problem with these suites is that they carry a larger "footprint" to work. Footprint refers to the amount of  RAM it requires to stay running in the background. The bigger the footprint, the less resources your system has available to run your everyday software. Therefore, they tend to slow your systems down, especially older systems.

Even if you are running the latest and greatest AV suite, at the end of the day the buck stops with the user. If the user clicks or lands on a malicious site while browsing or tries to open a malicious file attached to an email, there is a good chance the AV suite will protect you. But there is also a chance that it will not. This is because any AV solution is only as good as it's last update. Viruses have a signature and the AV software needs to know this signature in order to detect it and determine that it is bad.  But it takes time for AV programmers to discover these signatures, create a signature update file for the AV software and distribute it to you, the user. Meanwhile, new viruses are being created and are out there waiting for you to allow them to infect your system. So always be careful and update your AV software regularly!

Should you run more than one AV program?  Sounds like a good idea right?!  Well, the short answer is... no.  Doing so could cause conflicts within your system and erratic behaviour including system or program crashing. If you run more than one AV program, the programs will sit there in RAM together, not knowing that the other is even there and they may end up seeing the other AV programs actions and see them as potentially malicious and start to do their AV thing. Then the other AV program now sees this behaviour and it starts to its AV thing. Next thing you know, you have a little AV battle going on in the background (in RAM) sucking up system resources and well, creating havoc and slowing down the system or even bringing the system to a halt. 

We can help you select the best AV solution for you and/or your business. There are many excellent products out there that are "lean and mean".  Lean refers to that footprint and the amount of resources the AV program needs to do it's job.   

Well, that's all for this week's segment of Who Knew? We hope you found it helpful! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this week's segment. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site at www.techkey.ca for our previous segments or check out our Facebook page www.facebook.com/TechKeySupport. For now, stay safe and well! We will see you next week for Who Knew? #17!

Who Knew? #15

Who Knew? #15
Welcome to this week's segment of Who Knew? Each week we strive to bring you something that you might not have known about and hopefully that you can benefit from. This week, just for fun, we thought to change it up a bit. So, without further adieu, we bring you this week's Who Knew?!

Who knew ... that Wombat poop is cubed shaped!? I mean, wow! Scientists are apparently studying this phenomenon in hopes to learn something that might be of benefit and incorporated into engineering practices. Here is a great article where you can read more – I know, how do you know this link is going to go where it says? Did you read "Who Knew #6?". Before you actually click on this link, hover your mouse pointer over it and in the bottom left of your browser you will get the actual address of where the link will take you. https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/01/how-do-wombats-poop-cubes-scientists-get-bottom-mystery

Who knew ... that the Platypus glows in the dark?! Absolutely incredible, right! I mean, this creature's duck-like bill and beaver tail is fascinating enough, but this little known talent of glowing, is simply amazing! Well, it’s not entirety accurate that they glow in the dark. It’s while under black light that they glow. To learn more about it, click here: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/glowing-platypus

So we hope you don't mind that we changed things up a little bit this week and had a little fun. Next week we will get back to our regular scheduled programming. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our website for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. For now, stay safe and well and we'll see you next week for Who Knew? #16!

Who Knew? #14

Who Knew? #14
Welcome to this weeks segment of Who Knew?. Last week we introduced you to the power of the search bar.  Our Who Knew #2 introduced some handy Windows Key shortcuts.  This week we thought to show you a few more shortcuts you might find handy!

Windows Key + Period:  Now that we are all social media savvy, 🤔 have we all not fallen in love with emoji’s.  Well, now we can put them her and there and everywhere!  Press Windows Key + Period.  This will bring up a handy window of some great emoji’s you can place within your document or basically anything you are working on.  😎 It also gives you quick access to some handy symbols and even kaomoji’s if you are so inclined.  

Windows Key + H:  this keystroke opens windows dictation capabilities. Windows has always been particularly good at dictation or otherwise known as, speech to text.  It takes a little to get use to, but it works really well.  You even can say most punctuation and it will try and determine if you want the word “comma” or the actual “,” based on what you have been typing.  How cool is that!  Play with it in Word or your email app or any app that requires any amount of typing.  You’ll love it!  

“Show me the desktop” Bar: The desktop is basically our home base within Windows 10.  It’s the are of the screen we see when no applications or windows are open and “on it” we find short cut icons (or actual files if you place them there).  If you have lots of apps/windows open and you need to quickly get to the desktop, press the “Show me the desktop” Bar.  Where is it?  Look at the bottom of your screen.  Now look all the way to the right, past the date and time, past any notifications and all the way to the edge.  There you will see a tiny bar.  Bring your mouse here by dragging it all the way to the right and all the way down and click once.  Boom!  You are back to your desktop.  Do it again… and your apps/windows will be restored.  Very handy! That's all we have for you for this weeks segment of Who Knew?. We sure hope you enjoyed! Be sure to PM us if you have any questions or need any clarification on this weeks segment.

Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. For now, stay safe and well and we’ll see you next week for Who Knew? #15!

Who Knew? #13 (2-18-21)

Who Knew? #13
Welcome to this weeks segment of Who Knew?. Last week we talked icons, this week we'll talk about how to protect your system in the event that things go wrong.

Windows 10 comes with so many features that many users don't know about and some are there to help you in the event that things go wrong. One disaster recovery method available to users utilizes restore points. Oddly, we encounter many systems which don't have this feature activated. We recommend you create manual restore point whenever a major upgrade/update/install is about to be performed. Things like significant Windows Feature updates, AntiVirus installation or other large software installs such as MS Office or maybe PhotoShop or a CAD app. If something goes wrong, these restore points can often bring you back out and bring you back to a date/point in time before the update or software was installed. Many (but not all) application installs automatically create a restore point for you prior to beginning their install procedure for their software.

So, restore points are important and it's important to know how to create one manually to protect yourself prior to making significant changes to your system. It's not hard to do. Let's take a moment and check your settings and then we'll create one together.

In your search field (lower left of your screen beside the Windows logo) type "restore point". Windows should give you the option to choose "Create a Restore Point". Go ahead and select that. The resulting window will give you the option to "Configure restore settings..." Let's do that first. Select "Configure".

In the resulting window we need to make sure "Turn on system protection" is active. Then you can configure the disk space usage. Usually the default is good but if you have a lot of free storage, you can slide the bar to the right to increase the space the system has to work with. When you are happy, go ahead and click "OK" to go back to the previous screen.

Now all you need to do is click "Create". Windows will prompt for a description. Be creative. Maybe something like "Before I install my AntiVirus" or "I'm about to update Windows 10" and of course click "OK" when you are done. Windows will show you the progress and let you know when the restore point has been successfully created and send you back to the previous window. That's it, you're done! Again, recommend you create manual restore points whenever a major upgrade/update/install is about to be performed. Restore points do not overwrite the previous restore point so if you ever have to recover from a restore point, you will be presented with a list of all the points created the past. Sort of like snapshots in time.

In conjunction with knowing how to create restore points, make sure you have an adequate backup strategy in place. External hard drives are reasonably priced these days and most include backup software for daily backups of those precious photos etc.. We would be happy to help you with this so give us a call!

That's all we have for you for this weeks segment of Who Knew?. We sure hope you enjoyed! Next week we'll try and lighten things up a bit. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. For now though, stay safe and well. We’ll see you next week!

Who Knew? #12 (2-4-21)

Who Knew? #12
Welcome to this weeks segment of Who Knew?. Last week we talked icons, this week we'll talk about how to protect your system in the event that things go wrong.

Windows 10 comes with so many features that many users don't know about and some are there to help you in the event that things go wrong. One disaster recovery method available to users utilizes restore points. Oddly, we encounter many systems which don't have this feature activated. We recommend you create manual restore point whenever a major upgrade/update/install is about to be performed. Things like significant Windows Feature updates, AntiVirus installation or other large software installs such as MS Office or maybe PhotoShop or a CAD app. If something goes wrong, these restore points can often bring you back out and bring you back to a date/point in time before the update or software was installed. Many (but not all) application installs automatically create a restore point for you prior to beginning their install procedure for their software.

So, restore points are important and it's important to know how to create one manually to protect yourself prior to making significant changes to your system. It's not hard to do. Let's take a moment and check your settings and then we'll create one together.

In your search field (lower left of your screen beside the Windows logo) type "restore point". Windows should give you the option to choose "Create a Restore Point". Go ahead and select that. The resulting window will give you the option to "Configure restore settings..." Let's do that first. Select "Configure".

In the resulting window we need to make sure "Turn on system protection" is active. Then you can configure the disk space usage. Usually the default is good but if you have a lot of free storage, you can slide the bar to the right to increase the space the system has to work with. When you are happy, go ahead and click "OK" to go back to the previous screen.

Now all you need to do is click "Create". Windows will prompt for a description. Be creative. Maybe something like "Before I install my AntiVirus" or "I'm about to update Windows 10" and of course click "OK" when you are done. Windows will show you the progress and let you know when the restore point has been successfully created and send you back to the previous window. That's it, you're done! Again, recommend you create manual restore points whenever a major upgrade/update/install is about to be performed. Restore points do not overwrite the previous restore point so if you ever have to recover from a restore point, you will be presented with a list of all the points created the past. Sort of like snapshots in time.

In conjunction with knowing how to create restore points, make sure you have an adequate backup strategy in place. External hard drives are reasonably priced these days and most include backup software for daily backups of those precious photos etc.. We would be happy to help you with this so give us a call!

That's all we have for you for this weeks segment of Who Knew?. We sure hope you enjoyed! Next week we'll try and lighten things up a bit. Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. For now though, stay safe and well. We’ll see you next week!

Who Knew? #11 1-28-21

Brought to you by TechKey.ca, your local computer/network support specialists serving Caledonia and area for over 10 years…

Who Knew? #11
Last week we talked about creating a WiFi hot spot on your computer. This week we'll lighten things up a bit. We get quite a few computers in here for repair and new computers that need to be setup. It's amazing how many systems we get or come across that don't have the basic Windows icons on their desktop. They are so handy to have at your fingertips that, in this segment, we'll show you how you can activate/reveal them. Side Note: Why Microsoft doesn't have them activated out of the box is a mystery!

The icons we are talking about are system icons. We recommend the "User Folder (whatever the user name is)", the "This PC" icon (used to be called "My Computer"), the "Control Panel" icon and then finally, because most of us are joined to networks... even in our homes, the "Network" icon.

The User Folder is a direct link to the users storage folders. Things like, Documents, Music, Videos, Pictures... etc.

The "This PC" icon gives you all the User Folders and adds access to the drives that are connected (the main "C" drive etc) as well as network storage locations (if any).

The "Control Panel" well, this opens up and gives you access to everything you need to access within Windows.

The "Network" icon... we think most may need it. It does come in handy to have close by and gives you quick access to pretty much everything that is connected to your network. We suggest activating it and well, if it's not needed you can always deactivate it.

So... how do we easily reveal or activate these icons? (technically they are already activated, just not conveniently placed on your desktop) You could browse around and search for them individually and then add them as a shortcut. But if you follow these easy steps, Windows will put them on your desktop for you.

1 - click the search field (bottom left) to get a cursor and type Themes. As you type, Windows will try and predict what you are typing. Once the complete word is there, you should have "Themes and related settings" as an option.

2 - go ahead and click "Themes and related settings". The Themes window will open

3 - depending on the size of the window you may have to scroll. We are looking for "Desktop Icon Settings". If your window is large, it will be on the right hand side. (make a note to come back here at a later date - there are some cool Windows customization options in here)

4 - go ahead and click "Desktop Icon Settings". This will bring up an old friend from the Windows XP days. Now you just tick off the system icons you would like Windows to put on your desktop for you. Easy. Don't forget to hit "Apply" or "Ok" before you close the window.

Now, if you are looking at your desktop with all your windows closed you should see your new system icons nice and handy for you. You can drag and drop them wherever you would like.

That's all we have for you for this weeks segment of Who Knew?. We sure hope you enjoyed! Please take a moment to "Share" for others and as always, you can visit our web site for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. For now though, stay safe and well. We’ll see you next week!

Who Knew? #10 1-19-21

Who Knew? #10
We have no idea how it is that we dropped the ball last week. You missed us right! This week’s Who Knew? we think many will find useful. Read on for more!

Many people have WiFi capabilities in their home and/or business. But lets say you don’t because you prefer the faster and more stable experience that a direct connection gives you. But wait, now you want to connect your phone or tablet to the internet (and avoid using cellular data). Provided your computer has wifi capabilities (all current laptops do and even most current desktops), there is a way for you to do this. You can simply create a mobile hotspot on your system. Yes, we said “simply” - in just a few easy steps.
First, in the Windows Search box (usually beside the Windows logo, lower right of your display) type in Mobile Hotspot and hit “enter”.

In the resulting window on the right hand side, find “Share my internet connection with other devices” and toggle it to “ON”.

If it’s not already chosen, change the “source” of your internet connection where it says “Share my internet connection from”. If you are connected via WiFi, then that would be the proper connection but in our scenario, make sure it refers to your ethernet connection.

It sounds redundant but, below that it will give you the option of “how” you want to share your connection. In this case, we want that to say WiFi. It might have a bluetooth option but you won’t want that, it’s far too slow.

In the next section it should show you your network name, password and band. Select “Edit”
On the next screen you will be able to set the name of your Network/Hotspot as well as the password and the speed. I recommend 2.4 GHz. It might be a little slower but usually more compatible.

Now, from your tablet/phone/laptop, like you would normally, allow it to search for available WiFi signals and the name you called your Hotspot will be listed. Select that, enter your password and you should be good to go.

I have used this little capability on numerous occasions. Once at work I wanted to give a customer temporary access to the internet from my work PC and the wifi was very unreliable. I turned on the hotspot and gave them access through my work laptop. Be careful doing this though, it may not be permitted in some office network environments - always best to get permission.

Don't forget to turn off your hotspot when finished.

We hope you enjoyed this weeks segment of Who Knew?. As always, you can visit our web site for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. For now though, stay safe and well. We’ll see you next week, back at our Thursday time slot.

Who Knew? #9 1-7-21

We’re going to change gears for this weeks Who Knew?. Over the holidays we had two customers who were exposed to two different types of cyber threat. One was by phone and the other was brought to them through email.

Similar to that call many of us have received which is an autobot saying: “this is Canada Revenue, your social insurance number is under investigation. Press 1 to speak to our investigating agent… blah blah blah”. In this case, our client answered a call from an unknown caller but there was a real person on the line. Upon answering, the caller identified themselves as Microsoft Security. They proceeded to explain in a very concerned and convincing voice that “your computer has been identified by it’s IP address. It has been compromised and it must be fixed or we’ll have to lock it down.” To the unsuspecting, these thieves can be quite convincing leading the person to be drawn into the scam. The scammers then convince their victim to click here and click there, often bringing them to the Windows Event Viewer within their own system and showing them errors that their computer is reporting. Systems are always reporting errors of sorts behind the scenes. All very normal. When they reveal these errors to their prey they then exclaim “ah yes, there it is, you see. This has to be fixed immediately.” This scenario can then go in a number of different directions. In this particular case the scammers convinced their target to “let them in” got them to download some remote software. Once in, they quickly make changes here and there while quoting on how much it will cost to get this situation cleaned up. For our customer, the red flags were enough to finally say that they were not interested and as soon as they said that, the scammers hung up. They operate on a quota and need to move on to their next victim. Meanwhile, the damage was done. The scammers entrenched themselves into this persons computer, changing system passwords etc., making it impossible for the person to login to their computer. At this point, they did the right thing. Realizing their system has been compromised, they shut down their system and called us! We were fortunate to be able to renew their system for them. We recommended they change their passwords and even to monitor their banking information. Fortunately they did not use this system for online banking.

So, be cautious of calls you receive over the phone. Take a pause and ask some questions. Sometimes “they” have enough information on you to make it quite convincing. If you are unsure, a good test is to say “I’m sorry, I can’t talk right now. Can I get your number and extension and I’ll call you back”. Or… “sorry, I don’t take unsolicited calls. Can I get your name and number and I’ll call you right back?” If it’s a scammer, 99.99% of the time, they will hang up.

For the second example, this client was attacked by an email. The email subject said something like “Your documents are attached” and then, within the email, it said something like “Here are those documents you were waiting for. The password to open is xxxxxxx”. And sure enough, the attachment is a ZIP file which is a compression format that allows senders to put a bunch of files together to make them smaller and easier to send via email. Sort of like putting physical paper documents into an envelope, putting an address and stamp on the envelope and sending via the post office. In this case, think of the ZIP file as an envelope with files inside. ZIP files can be very handy tools. But for scammers, ZIP files can be used to hide malicious files. When opened, the files within are programmed to be triggered and infect the users machine. This particular customer was unsuspecting because they often receive documents from clients that need signing etc., and this email was seemingly from a known contact. Fortunately for them, when they went to open the files their antivirus kicked in and quarantined the malicious file. After contacting us, we deleted the malicious email and did a full scan of their system to make sure in fact nothing was spread.

There are a number of things we should do when working with email:

• Look at the wording in the subject. Does it seem ok? Is the subject missing? I often scold people for not putting a subject in their emails. Often those are automatically flagged as spam and never reach their recipient. I always treat them with suspicion.

• Look at the body of the message. Within a malicious email the body is usually impersonal, quick and to the point. No salutation or greeting. In this case, simply “here are the documents…”. So for those of you out there that simply put FYI: here you go (or whatever), know that your messages may not reach the intended because they are being treated as possibly malicious, as they should be! I know people who will simply say: This is a good one! (With a video attachment or a link). Or: FYI: this is cool! Nope, file 13 for me. Stay away and don’t send emails like that.

• Is there an attachment? If so, are you expecting an attachment from someone? If not, treat it with suspicion.

◦ I recommend turning off the automatic download of attachments in email settings. Believe it or not, even attached images (logos etc.) can be malicious or put there for a purpose like monitoring the email they sent. Companies will often put small but blank images on an email. When you open the email, your program downloads all images (set by default), even the blank ones, and in doing so the company gets a notification that someone has downloaded their message. That’s how they keep tabs on how effective their email campaign is.

The buck stops with us. There are groups out there that play the percentages and if they contact enough people via phone or through these emails, all they need is 1% success rate and they rake in millions of dollars or farm tons of information to be used for other malicious activities. It’s scary right? But by following some easy steps, you can keep yourself a lot safer and enjoy what technology has to offer.

We hope you enjoyed this weeks segment of Who Knew?. As always, you can visit our web site for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. For now though, stay safe and well. We’ll see you next week!

Who Knew? #8 12-17-20

Before we get into this weeks Who Knew? Segment, we at TechKey.ca Computer Support Services would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year! Stay healthy, Stay safe!

This weeks segment touches on some more, rarely known but super handy, shortcuts. These shortcuts are specifically used when typing documents… Enjoy!

• To move your cursor quickly to the previous word, type CTRL-Left Arrow
• And of course you can move word by word to the right by typing CTRL-Right Arrow
• To recover something you just deleted… press ALT-Backspace to bring it back
• To delete the entire word to the left of the cursor, press CTRL-Backspace

And how about a few handy mouse tricks you can use when typing a document:

• To highlight a single word for editing, double click on it
• To highlight a complete sentence for editing, triple click one of the words within it
• And yes… click four times within a paragraph to highlight the entire paragraph

Some of these shortcuts take a bit to get used to but if you spend a little bit of time with them, they will become second nature and real handy.
We hope you enjoyed this weeks segment of Who Knew?. As always, you can visit our web site for our previous segments or find us on Facebook. Again, we wish you a Merry Christmas… Happy Holidays… and if we miss you next week, a safe and healthy New Year!

Who Knew? #7 12-10-20

So, hopefully you've had a chance to enjoy our past Who Knew? segments. If not, head on over to TechKey.ca when you can or join us on Facebook. One of our past segments talked all about keyboard shortcuts. This week is along those same lines but with a focus on the improved ClipBoard feature of Windows 10.

Just a quick review - Most of us know the "cut" and "paste" option when working with windows. Or "copy" and "paste". "Cut" actually moves an item from where it is, to the clipboard (This mysterious invisible thing that holds onto information in the background so you can use it later) for later "pasting" somewhere else. "Copy" does just that, copies the item to the clipboard for later "pasting" somewhere else. These functions can be accessed a number of ways in order to quickly move information from one area to another. One of the most popular and fastest way "cut" or "copy" to the clipboard would be to use the keyboard shortcut - once your item is highlighted or selected with your mouse, press "Ctrl" + "x" for cut... or "Ctrl" + "c" for copy. And then when you are ready to paste, click the area you would like to past to and press "Ctrl" + "V".

So, now that you have refreshed your memory on the clipboard feature of Windows, let's take a look at how the clipboard has been enhanced in the Windows 10 October 2018 update. Prior to this clipboard enhancement, if you put something onto your clipboard and then put something else onto the clipboard, the previous "thing" would be replaced. A real pain to be sure. Now, with this update, and when it's turned on, the Windows clipboard actually retains a history of the items you have put there. To turn it on (it is not on by default) first navigate to "Settings" (right click "Start" icon in the lower left of your desktop and click "Settings") then select "System" then scroll down and select "Clipboard" (or you can type "clipboard" in your "search" window and select from the result). Once there, make sure "Clipboard history" is turned on.

With that turned on we can now check out this new feature. If you are like me, you have often been working information from one document to another... copying this and pasting then needing to cut/copy something else but then, needing to copy the original item again and paste. It used to be a pain but now that you have extended the powers of the clipboard with this Windows Update (see previous paragraph) you can access all the items you have "cut" or "copied".

Let's try it... (assuming you have turned the feature on) next time when you want to paste something from the clipboard, instead of right clicking and selecting paste... or "Ctrl" - "v" from your keyboard, use the "Windows Key" (left of your space bar) + "v" combination instead. A window will pop up (your clipboard) showing you the last items you placed on the clipboard. You can use the down arrow keys and "enter" or your mouse to select the one you would like to paste. How handy is that! Don't forget though, the previous method still works to paste the last item you cut or copied without having to do the extra step of opening and selecting.

Play around with it - select "Windows Key" + "v" - to open the clipboard. Then click the right corner of an item (three dots) to remove it, pin it or clear all to start new. I like the "pin" feature for those things you might use on a regular basis (I have a few emoji's pinned that I like to use 😀 )

If this extended clipboard feature is not available on your Windows 10 system, you should look into getting your Windows 10 updates caught up. It is important to do this as each update not only brings new features such as this, but also plugs security vulnerabilities that have been discovered. TechKey can help you with that if needed, just give us a call.

As always, I sure hope you enjoyed this weeks Who Knew?! Please, don't forget to "like" or "share"... or "like" and "share" 😀 if you enjoyed. If I miss you next week, please keep safe and have a Happy Holiday and Happy New Year!

Who Knew? #6 12-10-20
Who Knew? #6
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So, hopefully you have had a chance to check out our previous Who Knew? segments. If not, head on over to TechKey.ca and check them out. Or our facebook page TechKey Computer Support For the topic this week we're going to change things up a bit and talk about security and how to protect yourself when using your computer or even using the phone.

It is unfortunate that we live in a world where we have to be so cautious when using the computer... or even using our phones. There are so many scams out there but one of the more common threats on your computer comes from links. Links are those lines of text, usually blue and underlined, that when clicked, they take you to some other place on the web. If you click a link in an email, it will automatically open your browser and take you to the intended web site. If the link is malicious, some fancy computer code can be triggered in the background that could try to exploit security vulnerabilities within your computer. But, how do you know if the link is safe or not!? Well, that's actually pretty easy. Before you click a link within an email or from the results of your recent Google search, or within a web page... hover your mouse over the link. When you do this within a browser, the "address" of the link will appear in the lower left corner of your browsers window. It will look something like this: https://some.website.com/more.text.and.stuff - I know, it looks a little complicated and somewhat overwhelming - some of these "addresses" can be quite long. The important part of the link though is the first section after the https. In this case - some.website.com . This tells you that if you click, you will end up at the website.com site on a page called "some" (seems kind of backward but that's just the way it is - LOL). A real life example... you receive a very convincing email that appears to be from Microsoft (or UPS or your bank) and it has a link that they want you to follow. If the link says microsoft.support.com well, this looks kind of legit right? But this (sample) link will send you to a place called support.com and a page called microsoft and NOT Microsoft the company... or a link that says UPS.customersupport.help.com is going to send you to a site (or company) called HELP and NOT UPS. (Note: .com could be .ca, .org, .net, etc.)

So, the bottom line is, be careful before you click and follow a link that is in an email or the links you find after you have done a google search or the links you might find on a web page. If that last word (before the .ca, or .com, or .org etc etc) looks like it may not be a legit company, don't click! If in doubt... don't click!

And finally, I wanted to share another scam that is out there that comes to you through your phone. I do quite a bit of shopping on Amazon. So, when a call came in and my call display said Amazon, I wasn't too surprised. I answered it. But straight away I knew it was bogus. There was an automated attendant at the other end who said I was in the call cue for customer service and if I wanted to continue to wait in the cue just say "Yes". Don't do it!! If you do that, what the scammers do is record you saying yes and they can use that along with other information they may already have on you - name, phone number, etc. - to authenticate your identity to other institutions. Don't say anything, just hang up.

These are just two areas that we honest folk need to be aware of. There are so many scams out there feeding off the unsuspecting general public. Some of them look so convincing! At the end of the day, the buck stops with us. Be aware, educated, suspicious and practice safe computing!!

That's all for this weeks Who Knew? As always, if you found it beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like LOL... See you next week for Who Knew? #7. Be safe!

Who Knew? #5 12-3-20

Brought to you by TechKey.ca, your local computer/network support specialists serving Caledonia and area for over 10 years...

Who Knew? #5
So, hopefully you have had a chance to check out our previous Who Knew? segments. If not, head on over to TechKey.ca or our Facebook page and check them out. Still working within Windows 10, last week we introduced to you a cool way to minimize all your open windows (applications) with a wiggle of the mouse. This week we are going to follow in that same train of thought - Window organization - and show you how you can work more efficiently with two windows (or more) at the same time. It could be two Word Docs... a spreadsheet and your accounting package... a web site and an email...

So, yeah... let's say you are working on a document and you need to refer to another window (application) maybe for figures within a spreadsheet or information found on a web page. You could "Alt-Tab" back and forth which is quick but tiresome if you are constantly needing to go back and forth... or, you can use this little trick to quickly organize your windows applications . It's really easy and handy.

Making sure both windows applications you need to work within are open, using your mouse, click and hold the top colour bar of one of your windows and drag it to the right (or left)... keep dragging as though you wanted to drag it off your screen until a transparent window frame appears and takes up half of your screen - that's telling you where your window will fall when you let go. Now, let go of the mouse button and that window you were dragging will automatically drop into that transparent frame, positioning itself on half of your screen with the other half revealing your other windows that are available for selecting. When you click one of them it will take up position on the other half of your screen. Now you have the two windows you would like to work with, side by side allowing you to easily work back and forth.

What's cool about this feature is, not only is it real easy to do but you can resize their relationship with each other by making one window bigger while the other gets smaller... you can do this by dragging (click, hold and move) the divider bar to the left or right. Both windows will adjust their size together. Another thing you will notice is, between these two windows, if you simply bring your mouse overtop of one you can automatically scroll within that window with your mouse wheel without the need to click on it. Move the mouse to the other window and it will then become active for scrolling.

Go ahead and give it a try. You won't break anything and once you get the hang of it, you'll see how handy it can be.

That's all for this weeks Who Knew? As always, if you found it useful or beneficial, go ahead and share... or like... or share AND like LOL... See you next week for Who Knew? #6.

Who Knew? #4  11-26-20:

Brought to you by TechKey.ca, your local computer/network support specialists for over 10 years...

Who Knew? #4

So, hopefully you have had a chance to check out our previous Who Knew? segments. If not, head on over to TechKey.ca and check them out. For this week, we wanted to continue the same organizational type Windows 10 theme as last week with a quick but cool tip on how to quickly minimize your open/active windows.

This short tip takes a bit to get used to but once you do, it's kind of fun and can be quite handy. Let's say you have lots of open windows and you are jumping around between them. Sometimes this can get a little confusing. "Where is that other window I have open" and you start minimizing them one by one in an effort to try and find it. Sometimes you may want to minimize them them all except for the main one you are working with. A real quick and easy way to do this is to single click and hold the top coloured bar at the top of your main window and while holding, wiggle your mouse. Just like that, all your other open windows will minimize to the taskbar. If you do it again, all your minimized windows will open back up. Cool Eh... Enjoy!

Once again, if you liked this weeks tip please spread the love by sharing. I'll see you next week for Who Knew? #5.

Who Knew? #3 11-19-20:

Last weeks Who Knew introduced you to the many Windows Keyboard Shortcuts that are at your fingertips when using Windows 10. One of those short cuts was Windows Key + Tab. This combination reveals a feature that can be quite handy for those who strive to be as organized as possible. The Virtual Desktop.

Virtual desktops are kind of like having multiple monitors on your desk. Users who are so lucky will often group task minded icons in different areas of the two monitors. Virtual Desktops allow you to create multiple virtual desktops (virtual monitors if you will) which can be organized to keep you organized. For example, you could create a virtual desktop that only has icons for your most used spreadsheets, or maybe projects. You could open up all your accounting related apps under one desktop, then change pace for a bit and switch desktops to do some marketing projects. If you use your computer for personal and business use you could create a virtual desktop for each, easily switching back and forth.

To create a virtual desktop press Windows Key + Tab, this will reveal the Task View (another cool feature we can talk about another time). At the top left click the + New Desktop. And just like that, a new fresh desktop is created. When you click the new desktop, your main desktop will disappear. Don't panic! Simply press Windows Key + Tab again, and choose your main desktop. In fact, you can switch from desktop to desktop by pressing Windows Key + Tab, or Windows Key + Ctrl + (left arrow) or (right arrow). Pretty cool eh... now you have two (or 3 or 4...) monitors in one!

I sure hope you enjoyed this weeks Who Knew segment. Please "share" this if you enjoyed and I'll see you here next week!

Who Knew #1:

As we all know, Windows has evolved quite a bit over the years. Each and every iteration is an attempt by Microsoft to perfect the users experience and make it easier to use. Some would argue they have succeeded (now in Windows 10) and others say... "how do I do that now!?" (I admit, I get frustrated from time to time too).

One little known tool that existed in previous versions of Windows is the "snipping tool". A really cool tool used for capturing things from your screen, mark them up as needed and save. With Windows 10, Microsoft is phasing this tool out in favour of "Snip and Sketch". At first I was thinking "leave it alone, I like the snipping tool!!". You can still use both for now, but I have forced myself to get used to "Snip and Sketch". And... I LIKE IT!

Microsoft has made it easy to access by using the handy Windows Logo Key (more on that in another post). Simply press the Windows Logo Key (that's the key to the left of the space bar that looks like a window) and while holding it, press "shift" and "s". When you do that, you are automatically put in "snip" mode and your cursor changes to a + . Now click and hold the cursor at the upper corner of what you want to capture and drag to the opposite corner and release the mouse button. Don't worry, you'll see the capture square get big as you drag, letting you know what will be captured when you release the mouse button. When you release the mouse button, a window will pop up. Go ahead and click the resulting window and you will have an opportunity to review and alter (that's the "Sketch" part) with mark ups etc. Then, save it for later or paste into whatever project you have been working on.

Besides the square for snipping, there are 3 other capture types - lasso capture, window capture and full screen capture. Go ahead and play with it ... it works great and, you can't break anything. Have fun!

Stay tuned for next week's "Who Knew?!" and if you liked this week's post, please don't forget to share!

Who Knew #2:

So, hopefully you found last weeks Who Knew helpful. For this week, Who Knew that the windows key (Windows logo key beside the space bar) could be so handy with some everyday tasks. In fact, there are tons of keyboard shortcuts that exist within Windows that are worth checking out...

Here are some of my Windows Logo Key + favourites:

Windows Key by itself: Pressing it just once of course opens your "Start" Menu

Windows Key + D: Show or hide the desktop - effectively minimizes all your open windows revealing the desktop... press it again and your windows open back up.

Windows Key + E: Opens your file explorer

Windows Key + L: Lock your computer - handy at lunch break

Windows Key + P: Opens up your monitor/presentation side bar... great for people with multiple monitors or hooking up for presentations.

Windows Key + (+) or (-): Zoom in and out with your display.

As I mentioned earlier, there are many more keyboard shortcuts to explore. In fact, there is undoubtedly one or two that you may find real handy. This article is from cNet... it is safe to click this link... I promise!
https://www.cnet.com/how-to/all-the-windows-10-keyboard-shortcuts-you-need-to-know/